Fair use policy applies
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/198167_youth04.html
MIAMI -- Rock stars and media celebrities courted them, as did a small army of voter registration activists and the campaigns of both the major presidential candidates.
In the end, huge numbers of young people voted Tuesday, although the record overall turnout meant that young voters' percentage of the total number of ballots cast stayed the same as in the 2000 contest -- about 18 percent.
But activists were buoyed that the turnout among 18- to 29-year-olds jumped by 9.3 percent over the level in 2000.
"We're seeing extraordinarily high turnout," said Holly Teresi, spokeswoman for the YouthVote Coalition, a non-partisan collection of groups that worked to encourage youth political participation. "In the battleground states, young people were voting at the same rate as 60-year-olds. That's huge."
Figures tabulated yesterday by The Associated Press showed that a total of 114.9 million Americans had voted with 99 percent of precincts reporting. However, Curtis Gans, director of the non-partisan Committee for the Study of the American Electorate, put the total turnout at nearly 120 million people. That represents just under 60 percent of eligible voters -- the highest percentage turnout since 1968, Gans said.
Pundits and political strategists had targeted the youth vote as a potential game breaker in the presidential contest, especially after the country saw a flood of new voter registration. The conventional wisdom was that many of those new voters were young and that they might be more likely to back Kerry.
Although Kerry did take 54 percent of the youth vote, compared with 44 percent for President Bush on Tuesday and 48 percent for Al Gore in 2000, activists say the mainstream media missed the mark in its predictions about young voters.
"It wasn't a good assumption that youth would vote as a monolith for Kerry," said Adam Alexander, a spokesman for the New Voter Project, another non-partisan group that helped register 350,000 young people in six states. "I think the lesson is that you can't take the youth vote for granted."
Preliminary estimates compiled by the University of Maryland's Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement showed about 20.9 million youths voted, an increase of 4.6 million from the 2000 election. The number will rise, too, as provisional and absentee ballots are tallied.
The percentage of eligible young people who voted was estimated at 51.6 percent, up from 42.3 percent in 2000.
Analysts offered a variety of reasons for the intense interest by young voters, starting with the fact that people of all ages were fixated on a contest that presented stark choices over contentious issues such as the economy, the war in Iraq and the threat of terrorism.
Still, as any advertising executive would attest, young people are distinct from their elders in many ways. Political campaigns may only now be learning that they must hone their message carefully in order to win the youth vote -- something former President Clinton proved with his groundbreaking appearance on MTV during the 1992 campaign.
"You can get young people to vote, but they want to be invited to the party," said Mary Dixson, assistant director of the Anette Strauss Institute at the University of Texas. "They're courted by the media, by Verizon and Levi's and everything else, and their attention doesn't get drawn unless there is a focused effort."
Many experts thought the war in Iraq, along with rumors that have swirled on some college campuses that a military draft might be reinstated, would have meant Kerry would have carried the youth vote by a much larger margin.
Activists, however, weren't surprised by the results.
"Everybody thought they'd all be for Kerry, but our polling showed young people were really split between Kerry and Bush," Teresi said. "Young people cared about the economy, terrorism and Iraq, education and health care."
Indeed, the Bush campaign clearly didn't write off the youth vote, perhaps mindful that many young people, especially from religious and conservative families, might be counted on to vote as their parents do.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/198167_youth04.html
MIAMI -- Rock stars and media celebrities courted them, as did a small army of voter registration activists and the campaigns of both the major presidential candidates.
In the end, huge numbers of young people voted Tuesday, although the record overall turnout meant that young voters' percentage of the total number of ballots cast stayed the same as in the 2000 contest -- about 18 percent.
But activists were buoyed that the turnout among 18- to 29-year-olds jumped by 9.3 percent over the level in 2000.
"We're seeing extraordinarily high turnout," said Holly Teresi, spokeswoman for the YouthVote Coalition, a non-partisan collection of groups that worked to encourage youth political participation. "In the battleground states, young people were voting at the same rate as 60-year-olds. That's huge."
Figures tabulated yesterday by The Associated Press showed that a total of 114.9 million Americans had voted with 99 percent of precincts reporting. However, Curtis Gans, director of the non-partisan Committee for the Study of the American Electorate, put the total turnout at nearly 120 million people. That represents just under 60 percent of eligible voters -- the highest percentage turnout since 1968, Gans said.
Pundits and political strategists had targeted the youth vote as a potential game breaker in the presidential contest, especially after the country saw a flood of new voter registration. The conventional wisdom was that many of those new voters were young and that they might be more likely to back Kerry.
Although Kerry did take 54 percent of the youth vote, compared with 44 percent for President Bush on Tuesday and 48 percent for Al Gore in 2000, activists say the mainstream media missed the mark in its predictions about young voters.
"It wasn't a good assumption that youth would vote as a monolith for Kerry," said Adam Alexander, a spokesman for the New Voter Project, another non-partisan group that helped register 350,000 young people in six states. "I think the lesson is that you can't take the youth vote for granted."
Preliminary estimates compiled by the University of Maryland's Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement showed about 20.9 million youths voted, an increase of 4.6 million from the 2000 election. The number will rise, too, as provisional and absentee ballots are tallied.
The percentage of eligible young people who voted was estimated at 51.6 percent, up from 42.3 percent in 2000.
Analysts offered a variety of reasons for the intense interest by young voters, starting with the fact that people of all ages were fixated on a contest that presented stark choices over contentious issues such as the economy, the war in Iraq and the threat of terrorism.
Still, as any advertising executive would attest, young people are distinct from their elders in many ways. Political campaigns may only now be learning that they must hone their message carefully in order to win the youth vote -- something former President Clinton proved with his groundbreaking appearance on MTV during the 1992 campaign.
"You can get young people to vote, but they want to be invited to the party," said Mary Dixson, assistant director of the Anette Strauss Institute at the University of Texas. "They're courted by the media, by Verizon and Levi's and everything else, and their attention doesn't get drawn unless there is a focused effort."
Many experts thought the war in Iraq, along with rumors that have swirled on some college campuses that a military draft might be reinstated, would have meant Kerry would have carried the youth vote by a much larger margin.
Activists, however, weren't surprised by the results.
"Everybody thought they'd all be for Kerry, but our polling showed young people were really split between Kerry and Bush," Teresi said. "Young people cared about the economy, terrorism and Iraq, education and health care."
Indeed, the Bush campaign clearly didn't write off the youth vote, perhaps mindful that many young people, especially from religious and conservative families, might be counted on to vote as their parents do.